Beverages, such as soft drinks and beer, are distributed commercially in glass and plastic bottle and in aluminum cans. Single service beverage containers, which typically contain six to twenty-four ounces of the beverage, are grouped into individual cases, each of which contains twenty-four individual containers. These cases may be further subdivided into groups of six, eight or twelve individual beverage container packages. Typically, each case of individual containers or multiple container packages is loaded by an automated tray packing system into a separate tray for transport from the site of a bottling company to the point of sale, such as at a grocery store.